GUNA YALA (SAN BLAS ISLAND) TRIP

Here it was just two weeks of busy living in Chame, and I found myself responding "let's go!" to an email from our adventurous friend, Terry, showing an Ofereta.com coupon (which is like Groupon in the States) that advertised this:

Today's Oferta : Pay $25 for a day tour in Kuna Yala. Includes: roundtrip from dock to islands, breakfast & lunch, tour to a natural starfish pool and an island of your choice in Cayo Limon ($50 value) or pay $45 for a 2 people tour with San Blas Amazing Tour ($100 value)

The first thing we needed to do was pick a day.  When were the four of us free?  Let us check our calendar, and a minute later we decided any day but Wednesday (Spanish lesson).  Then we realized Clyde would have to drive, since our SUV is not 4x4, and with rainy weather as a possibility these days (being that it's rainy season), we did not want to chance getting within 45 minutes of the Carti Port and having to turn around due to washed out roads.  And the final discussion was what time we would have to leave Chame to get to the port by eight am, and maybe we should stay the night to cut our 4 hour drive in half.  Not that four hours is a long distance to drive, but the last two hours to the port are not the most easily managed, and even I was exhausted sitting in the backseat from the hills, potholes (craters), curves, and did I mention steep, steep up and down hills?  Two recommendations are to get a good night's sleep the night before the drive, and to stay by the airport.  We took heed, and we did manage the latter.  This is why we weren't successful with the good night's sleep:

Backpacker Inn aka Express Inn Aeropuerto PTY

Secured door locks

Long scary halls (pretty tiled floor)

Men stayed poolside through the night

Breakfast was offered, but we would be gone by six am (although we did get juice, coffee and some cookies)

It was a place to put our head on the pillow.  For what was considered a pillow.  The bed was surprisingly comfortable.  It was thought to be a new hotel and an addition to the hotels that are near the airport (this one is right next to the Park and Fly).  There aren't many hotels outside of Panama City to the east of the airport, or better yet, northeast of the airport towards Chepo.  TripAdvisor showed some hotels, but reviews were few and far between, rates were not available, or we found that the motels had closed.  The Express Inn would be $25/night.  With the Oferta coupon being such a great value, we didn't want to spend a lot of money on a place to sleep.  But when we arrived to check in, we were told that the rate is $25 for the first person, $10 for an additional person and tax.  Our $25 room was $37.50 (using our Jubilado Discount).  

After check in, and then changing a room, since Terry's toilet was on the floor in bathroom, we decided to leave our things in the car, and Clyde volunteered to drive us around the town of Cerro Azul.  Cerro Azul is a 45 minute drive from the city, but we wanted to go up the mountain (2,500 ft elevation) to the gates of Los Altos de Cerro Azul.  We drove past a lake with lakeside homes, through a small town with several churches, fondas, and maybe a grocery store.  We were treated to breathtaking views, and we found Fuker park (pronounced FOOKER).  A recreational area for children with soccer and baseball fields, a pool, restaurant and bar.  We could now count Cerro Azul as another place that we browsed, but we don't need to revisit again.  It's all about location even for us in Panama.  Once we grabbed dinner at MetroMall (I have been here way too much), we decided we could go back to the inn and try to sleep.  The owners and other visitors didn't want to sleep, so we didn't get very much either.  We were eager to shower (okay, not really), get the day going, and to check out of the inn haha

At 5:30 Thursday morning, we loaded up the car and hightailed it up the mountain to the Guna Yala.  This area is still called San Blas by most people.  Later, it was called Kuna Yala and then in 2011, the name was changed to Guna Yala.  This 230 mile narrow strip of land is along the east coast of Carribean Panama and is home to the indigenous Guna Indians. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guna_Yala

For this, I will keep calling it San Blas which is an archipelago of 365 islands with almost forty islands inhabited by the Gunas.  We arrived to the roadside sign that said "San Blas" at around 6:30, and we knew we had about one more hour of driving time.  At a little past seven, and after going up steep inclines and through some patches of potholes and washed out roads, we came to the first checkpoint.  We showed the guard our Pensionado Visa Resident Cards, and we approached the second guard within seconds.  The first guard wrote Clyde's name down, asked him questions (some understood and answered), and the second guard, I suppose, verified it all and reiterated the cost of entrance into the reservation,  We then approached the third guard and gate.  We paid $5/person (50% off since we are residents) and the car had to pay $5.  

We then drove another thirty minutes up, down and around the mountain sometimes seeing the Caribbean and sometimes seeing more mountains.  This part of the road was better paved, but the inclines are very steep, and there are also very steep hills going down.  Maybe it was wet when this Pepsi truck took the curve to fast?

Clyde listened to me and took the first right turn at the sign that showed Carti Port.  We questioned this move later when there didn't seem to be a boat dockside waiting for us that read "San Blas Amazing Tours".  I thought of Gilligan's Island at this point, too.  What nice people there are though!  They immediately noticed the four puzzled gringos, and we instantly had someone seeking help for us.  First stop was to the bathroom.  We paid .25 and took our turns waiting for the attendant to take a bucket of water and rinse the bowl out and clean the toilet before it was the next person's turn.  

Didn't see a boat with our tour name on it.

Registering, but our names were not listed.

Many Gunas headed back to their villages.

The bathroom was in the two story building.

 Our reservations were not to be found, and we were told to call the company and that our cell phone provider, Mas Movil, was available in this area.  Clyde passed the phone to our aid, and we then had someone finding our boat and our bilingual guide.  He now happens to live in Panama City (3 hour commute), and he studied English in Switzerland.  He has a one month old baby and a wife that lives in Western Panama.  We had a private tour.  So great!  Plenty of room to spread out in the boat.  We sailed off into the crystal clear water of the Caribbean and stopped at our first village.  This village is home to 1,000 Gunas.  We walked to the restaurant and our guide told us that on the menu that morning was fried chicken and holadras.  I have had experience eating holadras and was looking forward to the fried bread.  We were given instant coffee (actually quite good), and our plates were delivered full of what looked to be hot dogs in a sauce and a hojaldra. Terry did some research and found out we were served sausage stew (salchichas guisadas).  I do realize that it is polite to always make an effort to try the food presented to me, I did try two bites, but I haven't had a hot dog in a very long time, and I just decided to enjoy my hojaldra with some sugar sprinkled on top and coffee.  I was not taken out back and reprimanded for this, although my tribe of gringos gave me a hard time about it.  I decided it would be best to have a nice boat ride rather than an angry belly full of hotdogs.

The village we were to tour and have breakfast.

Our group of four alone in the restaurant.

Even though Panama has wonderful coffee, we were given Nescafe instant.

The hojaldra and salchicha guisados

Our guide then picked us up and walked us through the village.  This village houses individual thatched roof huts (which they are now replacing with aluminum) as well as large dormitories (sort of like cubicles in office buildings), a hospital, pharmacy, school, library, restaurant, stores and more.  There were skinny alleys that separated the huts.  The children were either dressed in uniforms for school, not dressed at all, or in regular apparel.  The Gunas slipped into our pictures here and there.

Thatched roof

Children walking the village

New aluminum added to the roof and side

Classroom

Office at the hospital

Dangers of smoking

Solar panels for electricity (the government provided these)

Children feed tropical fish

Different boats for different folks

Once back to the dock, we waited for our boat to come back for us (they come and go), and we sailed off to Perro (or Dog) Island for what would be amazing snorkeling.  We passed MANY islands along the way--some had huts on them where the Gunas lived, cabanas for lodging and restaurants, and many just had palm trees on them.  A fishing boat stopped to load our boat up with our lunch for the day, and we arrived to Perro Island.  There were just a few other tourists there (not really snorkeling, and we were glad to have our own equipment), we were brought a table, chairs and an umbrella for $3/person.  Actually, the table our Captain brought to us cost nothing, but we had put our things on a picnic table, and a woman came over quickly telling us the cost of that table.  So I suppose it would have been free.  We didn't ever use the tables except to load our things onto them.  Lesson learned.  Once we lotioned up our gringo skin, we entered the clear blue-green waters.  Ray and I snorkeled for perhaps two minutes.  We quickly stood up, looked at each other and just said "WOW!".  Big smiles on our faces, we submerged ourselves for what would be about two hours of pristine water filled with coral, colorful fish and whatever else I was seeing below the surface ot the water.

He is standing amongst our lunch.

Ray checking out the islands.

This is how the islands were...sprinkled.

Others were small.

Man in boat on island.

Yachts, catamarans, boats small and large and islands.

He led the way.

This is amazing!

Random hermit crab

I used a disposable water camera.  I do not have pictures of what I saw underwater.  They might have to get developed in the States.  Clyde and Terry posted videos that he took with his brand new GoPro underwater camera on their blog www.alongthegringotrail.blogspot.com  Go here to see so much more!

Once we spent our time in snorkeling heaven, we walked the beach picking up hermit crabs and, after asking the Captain if we could take shells from the water, we loaded our shells into the boat.  Our captain stopped at a natural piscina (swimming pool), but we opted to go to the natural starfish pool.

Terry photobombs my picture.

The Captain explains sand dollars existence to us.

Continuing along with our day (I think it is now about one pm), we ate some candy on the boat that Ray had brought along, sharing it with the Captain, his wife and the "overseer".  We also munched on a few crackers.  After wading in the warm water with the lone starfish and sand dollars for a while, we were then "dropped off" at another island for some shopping and to drink beer.  Another lesson learned here...beer won't be very cold on an island, and have the Captain buy the beer.  It will only be one dollar instead of the two dollars we each paid.  There was also bottled water and Coke.  Terry and I had a picture taken with a Guna Indian, we each bought a beautiful shell for $5, and we wandered this island taking more pictures.

Managed to get one picture of us with regular camera.  Notice how we are standing in the middle of the ocean!

A dugout canoe called a cayuko.

There are water tanks above for the bathrooms here.

Molas and shells (I bought a multicolored one not shown)

Sharkweek!

Delicious and filling lunch (coconut rice and patacones with fish caught that morning)

A tiny boat perhaps for what is below..........

one tired puppy

 Breakfast, tour, snorkeling, shopping, beer, lunch, picture taking, starfish gazing, so what else was there to do?!  We had brought along a change of clothing (I had left makeup, hairdryer, razor, shampoo, etc at home), our pajamas, hairbrush and toothbrush as a just in case we could stay overnight in a cabana.  We didn't know when we would be visiting these islands again (the road trip is a distance), so we wanted to stay if possible.  We wanted to maximize our time there.  Our Captain struck out when he took us to two popular islands filled with young tourists, but at the third island he told us we could stay overnight.  There were two oceanfront huts.  The one cabana could sleep ten people (we were afraid that if two of us were in there, the Guna would fill it up later in the day!), and the other could sleep five.  The native Guna was washing clothes and sheets in a large, white tub and told us she would make the beds up for us.  The bathrooms were some distance away, and the shower was right on top of the toilet.  For $60/person, we politely declined.  There was no haggling.  This was the price for a sand floor, no lights on when the night comes, and possibly a breakfast of "hot dogs" (we didn't think we would be staying past noon).  Clyde thanked the Guna woman and told her that her island was beautiful.

These are the lights turned on at night.  The bottle keeps the rain from getting them wet.

He had crabs in his boat.

Shipwreck in the water.

Cabanas we chose not to sleep in overnight.

For $55 with it being a Thursday night and our Retiree discount, we chose this bed.

Once we returned to Carti port, we again paid .25 to the bathroom attendant, rinsed our feet off, and although we only brought back four shells, it seemed like our things had expanded in the trunk while we playing in the water.  We loaded the car, and although it started to rain (and then pour), Clyde shaved five minutes off his morning time drive down the mountain.  A car ahead of us was being searched (what it looked like to us), we stopped for the guard to look at us, and then he sent us on our way.  Once to the open road, Clyde asked Ray to drive.  We pulled into Panama City and up to Hotel Las Vegas in the El Cangrego district at around 6:30 pm.  Clyde and Terry had stayed here in the past.  It is a hotel attached to Clyde's favorite restaurant, Pomodoro, and when we entered we could smell the Italian food being prepared for the guests.  Ray and Clyde checked on availability for the night.  For just about $55 using our Jubilado Discount (50% off weeknight rate), we were given suites.  Each suite had not only a large bedroom and good size bathroom with fantastic water pressure in the shower (remember I was using hand soap on my hair and borrowed Terry's hairdryer), but it also had a kitchen, family room, and dining room.  The balcony overlooked The Veneto Hotel (Wyndham chain) and gave us a great view of the highrises surrounding us.  

We all decided to be different and to try the famous boxer, Roberto Duran's restaurant called "La Taxca de Roberto Duran" (The Bar of Robert Duran).  We sat outside, because inside was frigid!  There was a cool breeze, and we all heartily ate our dinner.  Robert Duran is usually in the restaurant on the weekends we were told by our waiter.  The following morning the four of us, realizing how easy going we all were on this trip (look at what we started with!), ate a free continental breakfast of yogurt, breads, hard boiled eggs (not me), fruit, juices and real coffee.  Once in the car, we were back at Casa Cuarenta by noon sharing our stories with Gus.  It was time to unload and do the domesticated thing of cleaning our equipment, laundry, and grocery shopping.  Ray also got his haircut at a nearby Barber for $6.  He was super brave.  Four small nicks later (he didn't feel them) and a haircut that looks really close to what he paid $18 for in the States, he was happy.

Ray and I revisited Picasso's restaurant in Coronado (where Clyde had played music last week) to try the pizza.  It is 2 for 1 on Friday nights.  We sat outside with lightning striking in the distance, a nice breeze blowing, talking about where we had just been and how we didn't have to leave the country.  I even waved to a new friend that drove by (funny that she recognized me and vice versa).  Today we went to the Nissan dealership in La Chorrerra to schedule a service appointment for Tuesday morning.  With our limited Spanish, we again practiced with the service representative.  We stopped by Quesos Chela in Capira on the way back.  This is a famous cheese shop frequented by Panamanians, gringos and tourists.  Not only is there is a large parking lot (very rare here!), but we found hot fresh cheeses, empanadas, small pizzas, Pringles, muffins, cookies, yogurts and drinks along with VERY long lines.  I don't know if there will ever not be a long line, but perhaps I will go back when I can see things more clearly.  I would love to try some of the cheeses.  

Ray getting his first haircut in Panama.

At this Barber shop (next to the medical clinic we visited for Ray's bloodwork).

In La Chorrerra

The line at Queso Chela (there were two orderly lines with many hungry people waiting).

Just like any other Nissan dealership.

Fruit and Artisan stand near Queso Chela.

While boating back to the port, Ray and I marveled that we didn't have to leave the beautiful country. We weren't on a vacation that was ending.  Panama has so much more for us to see, and whether it is a day like today where we run errands, or go to the pool, or practice Spanish, we have a lot of time to see it all.  We just want to get it all ready for show for our daughter, our family and friends!